UBS trimmed its target price on AVEVA Group, up 5.6%, to 3650p from 4465p and reissued its “Neutral” rating.
DS Smith, up 5.9%, announced that it has appointed Alina Kessel as a Non-Executive Director to the company’s board. She will join the Audit, Nomination and Remuneration Committees of the Board.
Frontier Developments, up 4.7%, stated that it expects revenue to be at the higher end of the previously announced range of £65-73m, with operating profit, as reported under IFRS, likely to be around £11-13m.
Sareum Holdings, up 28.1%, announced that its CEO, Dr Tim Mitchell, delivered a presentation at BioTrinity 2020, regarding an update on its two proprietary TYK2/JAK1 kinase inhibitor programmes, SDC-1801 and SDC-1802, targeting autoimmune diseases and cancers.
Gaming Realms, up 21.4%, announced that its annual revenues surged 11.5% to £6.9m, while its loss before tax narrowed to £4.7m.
Quartix Holdings, up 15.5%, announced that its performance during the period was strong and in line with market expectations for the full year.
Dialight, up 8.1%, announced that its Mexican manufacturing facilities have been permitted to reopen and intends to initiate a phased restart, whereas it has already initiated a phased restart at its Penang manufacturing facility.
Cambridge Cognition Holdings, up 2.4%, announced that its preliminary results for the year ended 31 December 2019 will be on released on 5 May 2020.
Science Group, unchanged at 195p, announced that performance for the period was in line with its expectations and has further continued through April.
Tristel, down 0.8%, announced that it has appointed Isabel Napper to the Board as a Non-Executive Director and is expected to join Tristel's Remuneration committee.
Xaar, down 2.2%, announced that it has appointed Alison Littley as a Non-Executive Director with immediate effect. She will take over as Chair of the Remuneration Committee and Senior Independent Director with effect from 1 July 2020.
LPA Group, down 3%, announced that it will reduce its current production capacity to match demand, in response to a temporary suspension of operations by several UK and export customers.
Horizon Discovery Group, down 7.1%, announced, in its annual results for the year ended 31 December 2019, that revenues jumped 7.8% to £58.3m, while it reported loss before tax of £11.5m. Separately, the company announced that it has appointed Dr. Siddhartha Kadia as a Non-Executive Director with immediate effect.
UK markets closed higher in the last week, following news of positive results from a clinical trial of a potential coronavirus treatment. In economic news, the UK manufacturing sector activity contracted at the fastest pace in the 28-year survey history in April, while mortgage approvals fell to a 7-year low in March. Meanwhile, British annual house prices grew at the fastest pace since February 2017 in April. The FTSE 100 index rose 0.2% to settle at 5763.1, while the FTSE AIM 100 index advanced 1.5% to close at 4071.4. Meanwhile, the FTSE techMARK 100 index gained 1.5% to end at 4912.6.
US markets ended lower in the prior week, after the US President Donald Trump threatened to impose new tariffs on China, in retaliation for its handling of the coronavirus outbreak. On the macro front, the US economy reported its largest contraction since Q4 2008 in Q1 2020, while consumer confidence dropped to its lowest level since June 2014 in April. Additionally, the US manufacturing PMI slumped to its lowest level in 11 years in April, while weekly jobless claims decreased less than forecasted in the last week. The DJIA index fell 0.2% to end at 23723.7, while the NASDAQ index lost 0.3% to close at 8605.